Briefing - Tuesday February 28, 2006

Posted at 7:51 AM on February 28, 2006 by Bob Collins

I just finished a column about there being no Rasmussen on Minnesota today when, voila!... there it is.

Bottom line in the Senate. Everyone appears to be within the margin of error, although I find the notation that Klobuchar does better than Bell among moderates and unaffiliated voters to be interesting. But I don't have Rasmussen's premium service (see below) so I can't get access to the crosstabs.

Nothing from Rasmussen today on the Minnesota poll. Maybe tomorrow. We've been kicking around polling options for the last week or so at MPR. We used to use Mason-Dixon but we did so in partnership with the St. Paul Pioneer Press. But the guy who handled it has fled to the Strib and the PiPress is being groomed for sale so things are questionable on that front. MPR political editor Mike Mulcahy was at an event yesterday discussing polling and said a ton of people were there from the Star Tribune's polling unit, but they report they have budget issues too, and may not do anything until September.

Meanwhile, we've been looking at Rasmussen, to at least tap into the polls they're already doing but the word from the "experts" is that Rasmussen uses automatic dialers, and apparently that's a no-no in polling circles.

Sounds to me like there won't be a lot of media polls until late in the game this year, and maybe that's a good thing.

Around the planet today, DFL gubernatorial candidate Kelly Doran is on Midday today at 11. After listening to all of these shows in the last couple of weeks, I think it would be cool to invite them all back and do another, limiting all answers to questions posed by the public with a "yes" or a "no."

I'll also reintroduce the "blog" item I wrote from the Democratic convention a few years ago and, as you listen, when you hear the words "we need" at the beginning of an answer, you're probably not getting one.

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